Behind Green Blinds
by Chronicles of Dreams
Summary: Hakkaicentric drabbles, in an attempt to explain what does go on behind green blinds. Rating for language, POV to switch soon...
1. Imitations A Genuine Falsehood

A/N: My first shot at Saiyuki. I know it's not very good, but I promise that I'm improving, and the later drabbles feel more in character to me, at least…The bit at the end is a metaphor I'm rather fond of, referring to the concept of putting on a false personality for so long that it becomes a real piece of who you are.

Disclaimer: I wish I owned Saiyuki. I wish I owned a yacht. I wish I owned expensive Japanese designer clothing and piles of anime and a dollfie and a million dollar estate overlooking a pleasant body of water in which I could practice jetskiing. I do not own any of these things. I am poor, and profit nothing from this story.

* * *

Hakkai smiled pleasantly.

He smiled pleasantly when he bought groceries and apologized for Goku and Gojyo's rudeness. He smiled pleasantly when he reminded everyone to pick up their trash, or check to make sure they weren't sitting on a small dragon before they sat on his bed, or when he tore a youkai limb from limb.

He smiled so pleasantly that Gojyo had decided it was false.

Now and again, Gojyo feels the need to remind Hakkai that he doesn't always have to smile, and he can even frown when it rains. But Hakkai cannot discard his smile so easily, because while Cho Gonou may have only smiled when he was happy, Cho Hakkai must smile all the time to remind everyone (himself most of all) that he is happy to have been reborn. And it's true – he's not always smiling because he's always pleasant, but that doesn't make all his smiles false, and he truly is happy to have had another chance at life. So he almost feels resentment when people assume his smile is fake – why can't he smile when he wants to?

When you wear a mask too long, the mask becomes a part of you. Cho Hakkai could no more remove his smile than he could his skin.


	2. Impervious, Impressionable

A/N: I know this drabble gets vague towards the end – my actual intent was to have the last sentence be interpreted as pertaining to both Gojyo and Hakkai, so I'm sorry if that's a little confusing...and that's why I explained it here!

Disclaimer: I don't own Saiyuki. I only derive personal satisfaction from writing these stories, but no monetary profit.

* * *

Gojyo walked out of the bathroom toweling his long hair and slouched over the bed where he collapsed and lit up a cigarette. He looked sideways at Hakkai, who was sharing the room with him for the night. Hakkai was already in his pajamas, clean and somehow remarkably dry looking. Gojyo caught a glimpse of his profile over his shoulder – even when his face was straight, he seemed to have an enigmatic curve to his unassuming lips. Gojyo hated it. His eyes seemed strained, his face seemed weary. Seeing Hakkai like this was never pleasant. When he seemed weak or vulnerable, Gojyo felt betrayed: he had no right to be that way.

Because Hakkai always seemed impervious – clean and tidy and unruffled, always apologetic without being humble, strong without being arrogant. He was not perfect, but so damn close it was scary. In arguments, his ominous calm pervaded the conversation while he used his sharp tongue to eliminate any protest. His wit and intelligence was clearly above Gojyo's, his tastes and judgments refined beyond any manner he recognized. Hakkai always quoted fine literature and read books on things like chiropractory or ancient mythology. Hakkai always acted above everything around him, like he could laugh off any adversary. Gojyo expected that, he understood that. But when Hakkai was like this, he didn't know what to do. To Gojyo, simply Hakkai's being affected by the rain was disturbing.

Because Gojyo was impressionable. He lived like a carefree man and he acted impervious as well as he could, but the truth was that he often would do nothing but think over his mistakes in the jeep. Nonsensical things would parade through his mind, thoughts of a youkai that they fought the night before, or something Hakkai had told him about medicine, or a particularly colorful insult from Sanzo. He couldn't help regretting a lot of things – never his own past, it made him the person he was today. But things like all the little tragedies that happened along the journey, and the outstandingly, callously stupid things he would say to people without thinking, or the way he couldn't seem to understand how Hakkai was so clean.

He didn't regret himself, did he? He puffed on the cigarette. Hakkai sighed heavily, waving his hand before his nose while still staring absentmindedly out the window.

But maybe if he were more impervious right now, things wouldn't be this way.


	3. Incompetence Comparative Doubt

A/N: Hooray! I'm happiest with this drabble of the three I've written so far…I think it's because of the dialogue. Anyone want to hazard a guess at which Psalm I quoted in the end? I'm not particularly religious, so when I decided I wanted a biblical reference at the end of the story, I had no idea where to start. I eventually just opened the bible with my eyes closed and picked a page. The first time it was about the destruction of Jerusalem, the second time about Jesus condemning avarice, but the third time I struck gold and landed spot on where that Psalm started on the page. It seemed like fate!

Disclaimer: I do not own Saiyuki, Kazuya Minekura does. And she is brilliant.

* * *

"And if God does exist, then he's incompetent." Cho Gonou pushed his clumsily large glasses up over a young upturned nose. He found the sister's manner unseemly, how her face wrinkled up in pity, and she stooped to embrace him. He gazed impassively at the floor. But in a moment he forgot his statement in favor of contemplating the existence of a sister – another one like him. 

Years later, Cho Hakkai opened his eyes and blinked uncomprehendingly at the dingy grey ceiling and a soft yellow light, wondering aloud at the hell he has woken in.

Now he kills on a daily basis, simply to survive. The sinner Cho Gonou may have died, but the sinner Cho Hakkai still lives and commits his sins under the pretense of God's incompetence. When the question came from Gojyo, he was totally unprepared.

"Hey, Hakkai."

"Yes, Gojyo?" he paused with his arms full of laundry which he was taking to hang in the bathroom.

"I know you were raised Christian and shit, but do you honestly think that there is a God?" His long fingers twirled his cigarette idly, but Hakkai could see he was actually carefully gauging his reaction. Best to keep it neutral, then.

"What prompts you to ask such a question?"

Easily thrown off track, Gojyo raised his eyebrows in brief surprise before ruffling through his hair with his free hand, thinking aloud, "well, it's just that we have Mr. Holier-than-thou who actually doesn't give a shit about his religion, and then we have Goku who can't comprehend a non-edible deity…and then we've seen one of the goddesses herself, in the flesh…so where does that leave you?"

"Ah, you seem to have left out yourself as well, Gojyo." The reply came swiftly.

The laundry dripped once, twice, in the uncomfortable silence.

"I obviously don't care one way or another." Gojyo subconsciously brushed his fingers over his lips and examined his cigarette for the sixth time in the past half-minute.

"I see. I suppose you could stand to say that I take a neutral stance on this topic as well." Hakkai called out as he slammed the door to the bathroom, disappearing with his pile of damp laundry.

"Dammit Hakkai!"

Inside the bathroom, Hakkai sighed at the havoc Gojyo had wreaked with just one simple shower. Was it even possible to get suds up there? Well, he obviously had. He wiped down the bathroom and rearranged the bottles compulsively, neatening up the tiny sink counter as well. Finally, he hung the soggy towels and few pairs of extra clothes up on the curtain rod and towel rack. Mechanically he worked, and his mind distractedly chased itself into corners and trapdoors.

For what had happened to him and his parents, him and Kannan, he supposed there couldn't be a merciful, competent God. For what had happened to him and Gojyo, Goku and Sanzo, he supposed there couldn't be no God. While he found the idea of destiny comforting, he also found it constraining, and he equally disliked the idea of a puppet-master pulling the strings on people's lives. All he knew was that if there was a heaven (a Christian heaven), it would never accept him. He wondered if it would accept Kannan, who had committed the ultimate sin by taking her own life. He hoped that heaven would reject them both together, along with Gojyo-

Something seemed terribly wrong about imagining Gojyo and Kannan together. Perhaps because they so neatly separated his life into two: Cho Gonou, the sinner who loved his sister, and Cho Hakkai, the sinner who was saved and accepted by a demon. For all the sins of his past he could never atone. But then, he thought if there was a God, for all the sins overlooked, Hakkai could never forgive _him_.

He stepped out of the bathroom and closed the door softly, looking around for Gojyo. The half-demon had fallen asleep on his side, facing away from Hakkai. He went to gently pull the covers over the sleeping figure and saw that his old torn bible was clutched open in the man's hand, his index finger propping the pages open and indicating a psalm:

_Fools say to themselves,_

"_There is no God."_

_They are all corrupt,_

_and they have done terrible _

_things;_

_there is no one who does what_

_is right._

_God looks down from heaven at_

_people_

_to see if there are any who are_

_wise,_

_any who worship him._

_But they have all turned away;_

_they are all equally bad._

_Not one of them does what is_

_right,_

_not a single one…_

Hakkai blinked. He slipped the book from under Gojyo's fingers and buried it deep in the bottom of his pack.


End file.
